Windows Movie Maker Will Not Open

[DaveP]

When any of my users try to run Movie Maker they get:

"Windows cannot open this program because it has been prevented by a software restriction policy. For more information, open Event Viewer or contact your system administrator."

This includes Domain and local administrators. The domain is a new one and I am not aware of any policies we have put in place which would prevent this program from running.

I have checked the Event Viewer and there are no entries matching Movie Maker. I have cleared all of the old events and tried running it again. This time there are no entries at all.

File Mon and Reg Mon are not much help either.

Logged on locally as local administrator permissions are: Full Control on the Movie Maker folder and all items below.

I did find this post on Edugeek: Link but I do not feel that the solution indicated in this post because his network is 2003 and I am using Server 2008.

Movie Maker was working on my old Server 2003 network with the same stations and the same station images. All of the other software has transferred fine.

I found this post on the Movie Maker Forum: Link but this relates to a standalone station. Windows Update is not an issue as the stations have recently been updated in an attempt to resolve this issue.

Is anyone else having the same problem? Can anyone help with this?

Workstation OS: Windows XP Pro: SP3.

[jamesb]

At a guess I'd say you should look at your domain policies. Do you have any management software sitting on the network, or are you just using vanilla Windows?

[DaveP]

At a guess I'd say you should look at your domain policies. Do you have any management software sitting on the network, or are you just using vanilla Windows?

Oops: Missed that bit out: The old network was Viglen. The new one is vanilla.

[jamesb]

Can you get a GPResult output and have a look through it for any software restriction settings?

As another thought, try unplugging a workstation from the network and logging on locally, then seeing if you can run it.

[DaveP]

Can you get a GPResult output and have a look through it for any software restriction settings?

As another thought, try unplugging a workstation from the network and logging on locally, then seeing if you can run it.

GPResult: No settings applied for domain administrator which will affect Movie Maker running [Those policies that are set determine desktop wallpaper and Internet Explorer proxy settings.

Unplugging the network cable and restating the station: logging on as the local administrator and running Movie Maker gives the same result ["Windows cannot open this program because it has been prevented by a software restriction policy. For more information, open Event Viewer or contact your system administrator."]

GPEdit.MSC [Local Policy]:

Computer Configuration/Admin Templates/Windows Components/Movie Maker

and

User Configuration/Admin Templates/Windows Components/Movie Maker

in both locations the entry:

"Do not allow Movie Maker to run" entry state is "Not configured"

adjusting one or both to "Disabled" does not resolve the problem. Issue is still unresolved. I do not want to cross post so if anyone is indirect contact with Edugeek member Faza can they draw his attention to this post and get him to reply here. Perhaps his answer can help me after all. Otherwise I am out of ideas at the moment.

[jamesb]

Not in touch with Faza, but as a last-ditch stab in the dark what graphics card is installed? If its an NVidia, try updating the drivers.

[DaveP]

Not in touch with Faza, but as a last-ditch stab in the dark what graphics card is installed? If its an NVidia, try updating the drivers.

Looking at Faza's old post that thought had crossed my mind also. Trouble is:

This station does not have an NVidea graphics card.
This issue is affecting all of the stations on my network.

I had thought that I could try re-installing Movie Maker [somehow]

[jamesb]

See if you can get an MSI of it and roll it out via group policy. Maybe apply that to one station to start with and test it on there, then if it works apply it to the others.

Also try turning on security logging failure audits. See if that drops anything into the Event Viewer.

[k-strider]

have you been through all the GPOs from the PC all the way up the tree to the top of the forest and checked to see if
Computer Configuration -> Windows Settings -> Security Settings -> Software Restrictions

Has any policies applied to the EXE that is moviemaker

Also it could be a user policy so you should check down the user policies to the effected user objects.

User Configuration -> Windows Settings -> Security Settings -> Software Restrictions

Though from what you have said it sounds more likely to be a computer policy. does it effect the local administrator account too?

[Michael]

I know that Movie Maker can be very picky running on some hardware, mainly to do with what graphics card installed (as already mentioned). What graphics card do you have in these machines? The fact it worked ok before would point directly to drivers being a potential problem.

As an experiment create a new OU, disable policy inheritance and then move an existing computer object. Then make a copy of your domain admin account and call it admin2, for example and move this also into the new OU.

Then run gpupdate /force from the run menu then reboot. Does this make any difference?

[DaveP]

Solved this a while ago: It was a Group Policy setting [deeply buried]

My question now is:

Because it was affecting both Students and Staff is it a default setting in 2008 to prevent Movie Maker from running? If so what are the added risks associated with allowing it to run?

I ask because this did not arise as an issue until after the company helping us with the network fell out of favour and now they are not available to ask as to why this setting was originally put in place.

Any thoughts?

[ZeroHour]

Could you tell us what the setting was?
That way we can say if it is default...

[DaveP]

Can't find the policy that was affecting Staff at the moment. Looking at the GPO now it looks like it would not be a 'default' setting because it appears to have been attached to the 'Student Apps Banned/Allowed' GPO I have here.

So I guess I have partly answered myown question: Does not look like a default setting. Does not explain why is is there in the first place though?

Setting:

User Config/Administrative Templates/Windows Components/Do not allow Windows Movie Maker to run

[This is now set to disabled and movie maker runs. Will not save to their home location by default. Could be a profile problem and I am working on a new profile as we speak]

[sted]

i think it can be done as a pc policy as well as a user one but im not sure

ive also come across some software before (im trying to remember the name) that when that was installed effectively killed movie maker iirc it was either some other video package or some cd authoring software